Love Train. Bloglovin' Train.

Follow my blog with Bloglovin - In response to the untimely demise of Google Reader, which I will miss like a fat kid misses cake.  Google Reader, I just don't know how to quit you.

Homeward Bound, Part 2

We drove down I-15 to the airport

We flew over the Rockies

I got carded for wine and there were crayons at the paper-covered table

Somebody made this casino/racetrack an offer they couldn't refuse

I stood next to an old piano in a barn loft drinking a whiskey ginger

I procured a stash of Tastykakes, a Phila-delicacy, for coworkers on a 5:30 a.m. Wawa run

I ate kale slaw for brunch on the plane

Charlie and his tongue were overjoyed to see us

Friday Feels

It seems like the rest of the blogging world likes to put up a list of links on Fridays.  I wanted to beat the band and put this up last night, to be like the blogging equivalent of the Black Friday Sale that starts at 10 pm on the night of Thanksgiving.  Minus the trampling.  But yesterday trampled me instead.

I missed my first meeting of the day, because I forgot to put it on my Outlook calendar and got really into some spreadsheets and just spaced it.  Then I went to a meeting that didn't exist (because it was canceled and I forgot to take it off my Outlook calendar...).  I may or may not have told my boss to give her 7-year old prenatal vitamins to make her hair thicker (trust me, it was relevant to a conversation, but still).  Then I went to Pilates and accidentally stole a sweat towel from the gym and didn't realize until I was driving away.  Basically, I needed to go to bed and stop living the day that was Thursday, April 25th, 2013.  It just wasn't meant to be.

Here's some internet stuff I've been enjoying/looking forward to recently:

The first honest cable company  It's funny because it's so, so true.  If we didn't laugh, we'd cry.  Calling Comcast feels like stepping into the pages of a Kafka novel.

Pandora's Lunchbox: How Processed Food Took Over the American Meal  I have this book on hold at work, and I can't wait to read it.  Books like this get me every time.  I am a sucker for any book dealing with the history, politics, or culture of food.  I often think that if I wasn't a librarian, I would like to have a career that involves food in some way.  Either as a food journalist in the vein of Michael Pollan (but really, nobody is in the vein of Michael Pollan - he IS the vein), food blogger (can someone please pay me to spend the day inventing recipes and taking pictures so Andy will stop making fun of me when I do that?), or maybe even a nutritionist or dietitian (so I can get paid to judge people for their horrible eating habits help people to explore healthier ways of eating and see how good it can feel to eat nutritious whole foods).  Sidenote - are a nutritionist and a dietitian the same thing?  I should really know that but I don't feel like researching it.  Worst librarian ever.

What Would Don Draper Do?  Who doesn't love a good booze-fueled flowchart?

Kmart does something awesome.  For once.  This is not new, and probably the entire world has already seen this video, but pop culture trickles down slowly in Utah.  I don't even care.  YOLO.  Isn't that what the kids are saying these days?  I feel like Kmart has been Walmart's red-headed step-child for such a long time.  I really don't like shopping at either store, and in fact I think the last time I was in a Kmart I was buying a blaze orange hat in Vermont over Columbus Weekend in 2008 so I wouldn't be shot by deer hunters while hiking on the Green Mountain Trail.  But I mean, it's kind of hard not to root for the underdog, especially when the...opposite of underdog (overdog?) in question is Walmart, morally repugnant, poverty-perpetuating, glass-ceiling-reinforcing Walmart.  Not that this video has anything to do with Walmart, but you know, the view from up on this soapbox is fantastic.

Happy Weekend!

There's no place like hoaem

And no accent quite like a South Jersey/Philadelphia accent.  We took a trip back to the motherland this past weekend for a wedding and a birthday.  One of my oldest dude friends, from pretty much elementary school, got his marriage on.  It was a lovely, classy affair and my friends and I were completely sloppy and inappropriate.  Evan clearly had our needs in mind when he assigned us to the table all the way in the back and right next to the open bar.

The birthday was a covert operation.  My grandmother will by the big eight zero next month, and I hatched a plan, months ago, to try and get my entire extended family together for a surprise party, knowing full well that she would absolutely HATE (but secretly love) such an event.  My mom and aunt did a bang up job of lying, planning, and executing all the party details, and Grandmom was totally surprised and totally pissed (but secretly tickled).  I made a kale slaw that apparently was like eating a little green leafy pile of fire (because I come from a heat-intolerant family...we can eat our weight in pickled herring, but one chili flake and everyone's crying.  except me.  because I can totally drink a bottle of Cholula like it ain't no thang).  My mom made a cake that was 90% icing and almost certainly packed more butter into one slice than I normally consume in a year, but I regret nothing.  It was delicious.

While we were home, I had a chance to lurk around my grandmother's house with my new Nikon D5100 (the Christmas Present to end all Christmas Presents, which I am still learning how to use to its fullest capabilities).  What follows is a photo dump of my grandmother's house, my mom's dog, and some totally wild NSFW birthday party shots.

I love when we talk on the phone and I hear this clock bong in the background.  My childhood was punctuated in 30 minute intervals to the sound of this clock.

Do you see a robot face or boobs?  This is a real, working phone.  It's not actually a rotary phone, but it's almost certainly older than me.

These encyclopedias are from 1966.  In elementary school, I couldn't use them for a report on Neil Armstrong.  The index was all, "Lunar landing?  What lunar landing?  That's crazy talk."  So I went to the library.  Truth. 

I never got past Beethoven's Ode to Joy in my piano lessons, because the teacher was perpetually late.  When she did arrive, I could never stop staring at her eczema-riddled hands.  She was 1,000 years old and looked exactly like the grandma dinosaur from Dinosaurs.

Haunted basement.  I once watched my grandmom kill a snake with a shovel down there.   

Ancestors.  They're judging you. 

Nubbin

I wish I had a shot with a slice removed from this cake to show the icing to cake ratio.  There are no words.  Or, there would be words, but I'm choking on my brand new rolls of neck fat.  So delicious.

Old News

We got a dog.  Ajax strongly disapproves.  This glass door will never be clean again.

Currently

For a while, I've been feeling like I need a creative outlet, and that I miss writing, but I just don't know how to express myself anymore.  When I say 'for a while,' I probably mean for the last year, and when I say 'I miss writing' I really just mean that I have been very lazy.  And when I say that I don't know how to express myself, I really mean that I have been so simultaneously bored with and overwhelmed by all the thoughts bouncing around in my head that I just couldn't be bothered.

Picture one of those toy vacuums with the colorful balls inside that pop all over the place when you push the vacuum around.  Now picture that vacuum filled not with brightly colored balls but with beige squares knocking against each other.  That was my brain.

pay the mortgage.buy cat food.meet work project deadlines.plan, shop for, and execute balanced and filling meals that will please both a vegetarian and a carnivore.oh and don't forget your reusable grocery tote bags because you care about the environment, remember?and while you're at it, remember and acknowledge friends' and relatives' birthdays.hand wash bras.clean cat paw prints and dog nose prints off the sliding glass doors.respond to work emails...in a timely manner. get your oil changed.buy plane tickets for work travel.plan your presenation for that work conference.and oh my god pack your suitcase for the conference, but don't forget, you can't take half the toiletries you totally need, because terrorists.wouldn't it be fun to spend hours on the phone arguing with a non-native english speaker about your comcast bill?you should probably take the empty toilet paper tube off the holder and put the now half-used new roll on, because you left it perched on top of the empty roll like this haunting spectre of your inadequacy for three days, dammit!

Chaos can be boring, and being responsible is exhausting.  I feel like I do an excellent job of going through the motions of adulthood, but it feels like a farce and my 15-20 year old self would be so embarrassed and disappointed by how lame I have become.  I eat all the vegetables and go to bed before 10 most nights.  I don't stay out late, I don't blow all, or really any, of my money on CDs and concert tickets (does anyone still buy CDs?  Do they still make CDs?), and I shake my fist at skateboarders swerving all over the sidewalk.  I do say the F word a lot, if that counts for anything.  So while I re-find my voice, if I ever had one to begin with, I'm borrowing this writing prompt from one of my favorite blogs, Sometimes Sweet.

Feeling so very hungry.  Perhaps even bordering on hangry territory.  I have often joked that I probably have a tapeworm, because I feel the need to eat constantly.  Can we please make feedbags for humans a thing?  As I am writing this, it's 12:38.  That's about 1 hour and 38 minutes past my usual lunchtime, and about 5 hours and 38 minutes after I started to feel hungry.  If you are excellent at basic math, you know that means that at 7 this morning, I was hungry.  For context, I put my oatmeal bowl in the dishwasher around 6:58.  Truth.

Watching streaming news coverage of this Boston Marathon bombing...what is WRONG with people? Before that happened, I was going to have a jubilant answer for 'watching,' because season 6 of Mad Men has been intense and wonderful during the first two episodes thus far.  It gives me the oddest sensation of desperately anticipating Sunday evening, which is a feeling no working person should ever have.

Reading The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen.  I picked up a bookjacket-less hardcover copy from a pile of free books at work a few months ago, and just rediscovered it on my nightstand.  I really enjoyed Franzen's Freedom so I had high hopes for this one, but some of the characters' despair and poor life choices are bringing me down right now.

Also, the new issue of O Magazine arrived, and I'm devouring it with the same guilty pleasure I felt when I was 14 and would rush home from the bus stop to mix up my cookie pudding* so I could lay on the couch and watch every titillating minute of Oprah.  The racy episodes about feminine hygiene with Dr. Oz**, MTF transsexuals, and men on the "down low" were the best.  The "Oprah's Favorite Things" episodes were just unnecessary, though.  Oh, you're rich and love expensive things?  Shocking.  The magazine is a little more toned down, and a lot more "hey you all should buy this $300 free range fair trade cruelty free soy candle that smells like gardenias and success," but it doesn't disappoint.  I still feel a little like a naughty and/or weird child reading it, though.  Shouldn't I still be tearing JTT centerfolds out of Teen Beat?

*Cookie pudding was a sickening, shameful mixture of 3-5 Keebler's E.L. Fudge cookies dissolved in a glass of milk.  After an appropriate soaking period, the excess milk is sipped off the top and the soggy cookies are muddled with a spoon and eaten.  Repeat as necessary.  For best results, prepare in a primary-colored Tupperware sippy cup (lid optional).  

**Dr. Oz taught me, among other things, that "the vagina is a self-cleaning oven."  Direct quote.

Thinking about my next meal.  Obviously.

Looking forward to this weekend!  We're flying back East for a good friend's wedding and my grandmom's surprise 80th birthday celebration.  She really hates surprises, and was kind of angry (but secretly touched) when we did this for her 75th birthday.  I feel confident that she doesn't read this blog, so it isn't blowing the surprise to reveal it to the internets.  If she ever does stumble upon this here piece of internet real estate, she might disown me, so here's hoping.

Drinking apple cider vinegar water.  If drinking vinegar is wrong, I don't want to be right.  I started doing it right after Christmas, because after all the holiday binge-eating and airport traveling, I weighed 500 pounds, I was getting high every day, and I was washing my dishes in the bathtub was sick, bloated, and on the verge of a major skin meltdown.  I read that ACV has antibacterial and pro-digestive properties that would combat all of the above, so I gave it a whirl.  At first I was just doing shots of it (1-2 TBSPs, 2-3 times a day) but that was a little intense.  Now I mix the same amount in a tall glass of water, or, if I'm feeling fancy, a tall glass of seltzer.

This might be having a greenwashing effect on me, where I believe it is delicious and perceive that it is doing something amazing because of the purported health benefits, but I think it's actually working.  Can I be real with you?  Of course.  Real talk:  I've noticed that if I drink my vinegar water with a meal, I don't get that gross bloated feeling when I'm done eating, like I have been instantly impregnated with a food baby of approximately 8 months gestation.  Also, I haven't had a major breakout or any life-interrupting illness since I jumped on the vinegar train, so that's cool, too.

Word to your mother - to get any benefits from drinking vinegar, you most definitely want to be drinking the raw kind with the 'mother,' because you need the strands of beneficial bacteria.  Bragg's is a good option and the only one sold at my usual grocery haunt, but I'm sure there are plenty of others.

Listening to Joy the Baker podcasts.  I just can't get enough of them.  It feels like I'm hanging out with my own friends, just listening to their banter.  I want to be friends with them, and participate in this witty banter.  I must have listened to 4 straight podcasts yesterday.  Two while I was cleaning out the office area of my kitchen (it was out of control), one while running, and another while putting away laundry.  Andy made fun of me several times, because he can't wrap his head around it when I derive enjoyment from anything that he thinks is pointless (because Gold Rush and Bering Sea Gold and Pawn Stars are most certainly not pointless and are, in fact, helping you to grow as a person, Andrew).

Sidenote:  I have never tried listening to podcasts while running, because I thought anything other than uptempo music would slow down my stride.  I think I like it, though.  It will definitely help with the boredom factor on rainy days when the dreadmill is the only option.  Except we live in a desert, so it kind of hardly ever rains.

Speaking of dreading:

Dreading venturing outside.  Apparently it is snowing.  On April 15th.  I have no words.  Oh no, wait.  Now the sun is out.  All evidence of snow has disappeared.  But in the time it took me to type those sentences, it has again become cloudy.  This is some volatile business, and I wholeheartedly disapprove.

And now for something only slightly different

A one-year hiatus, to the day, would have seemed intentional.  A one year and 4 day hiatus just looks lazy.  I'm over it, though.

See, the thing is, I finally got that Big Girl Job I put on my unofficial Goals List last year, and then Adult Things happened.  And of course, by Adult Things I don't mean the kind of 'Adult' that you use a prefix to describe fun things, like using the term 'Adult Juice Box' to describe a tetrapak of wine.  I mean, those things happened, but also terribly boring/responsible/scary things like spreadsheets and taxes and frozen pipes.

After enough time passed without proclaiming my life force all over the internet, though, I started to feel like I didn't exist.  What if the two people apart from my mom who actually ever read this blog thought I was dead?  Well, I'm here to assure all two of you that I'm totally going through the motions of being a person who is alive.

Source

Except it's Thursday night, so I can't even get that part right.  Altough I'm not high on coke or freeboobing it under a mesh tank top, so there's still hope for me.